World Civilizations

Examines the Oldawan, the Ancient Soul of Africa, and its correlation with what modern psychologists have defined as the collective unconscious Draws on archaeology, DNA research, history, and depth psychology to reveal how the biological and spiritual roots of religion and science came...

The great pyramids of Giza have intrigued humanity for thousands of years. Questions about the construction and the purpose of these majestic monuments have existed since the middle period of ancient Egyptian civilization; in the sixth century B.C., Herodotus was the first of generations of explorers to travel to Egypt in an attempt to unlock their secrets. Recent cutting-edge research has uncovered information, unimaginable to previous generations, about how and why they were built.

This new book by Spencer Wells, the internationally known geneticist, anthropologist, author, and director of the Genographic Project, focuses on the seminal event in human history: mankind's decision to become farmers rather than hunter-gatherers.

Grâce aux progrès de la science (archéologie, ADN...), les fantasmes ne sont plus de mise pour traiter de la Préhistoire. La vie quotidienne, les croyances, le régime alimentaire, la sexualité, les rites funéraires... de nos ancêtres n'ont pratiquement plus de secrets. Notre regard sur nos lointains ancêtres change. Finie la créature hirsute grognant dans sa peau de bête du fond d'une caverne.

Through 10 unique cities, from the founding of ancient capitals to buzzing modern megacities, Paul Strathern explores how urban centres lead civilisation forward, enjoying a moment of glory before passing on the baton. We journey back to discover Babylonian mathematics, Athenian theatre and intellectual debate, and Roman construction that has lasted millennia. We see Constantinople evolve into Istanbul, revolutionary sparks fly in Enlightenment Paris, and the railways, canals and ships that built Imperial London.

Reveals the powerful influence of near-death experiences (NDEs) on the formation of religious beliefs, mystical literature, and ritual practices Focuses on the afterlife beliefs of five ancient world regions: Old and Middle Kingdom Egypt, Sumer and Old Babylonian Mesopotamia, Vedic India...

Among the extensive writing available about the history of ancient Greece, there is precious little about the city-state of Thebes. At one point the most powerful city in ancient Greece, Thebes has been long overshadowed by its better-known rivals, Athens and Sparta. In Thebes: The Forgotten City of Ancient Greece, acclaimed classicist and historian Paul Cartledge brings the city vividly to life and argues that it is central to our understanding of the ancient Greeks' achievements - whether politically or culturally.

Is geography really destiny? Our maps may no longer be stalked by dragons and monsters, but our perceptions of the world are still shaped by geographic myths. Myths like Europe being the center of the world. Or that border walls are the solution to migration. Or that Russia is predestined to...

Bernard Bailyn gives us a compelling account of the first great transit of people from Britain, Europe, and Africa to British North America, their involvements with each other, and their struggles with the indigenous peoples of the eastern seaboard.

A young Aztec girl tells her little brother how their parents create beautiful painted manuscripts, or codices. She explains to him how paper is made from local plants and how the long paper is folded into a book. Her parents and others paint the codices to tell the story of their people’s way of life. Inspired by the pre-Columbian codices, this story tells how the Aztec and their neighbors in the Valley of Mexico painted books and records long before Columbus arrived, and continued doing so among their Nahua-speaking descendants for generations after.

Here is the remarkable story of how medieval Arab scholars made dazzling advances in science and philosophy, and of the itinerant Europeans who brought this knowledge back to the West. For centuries following the fall of Rome, Western Europe was a benighted backwater, a world of subsistence farming, minimal literacy, and violent conflict. Meanwhile, Arab culture was thriving, dazzling those Europeans fortunate enough to catch even a glimpse.

One night in 1661, Nicholas Fouquet, a superintendent under Louis XIV, was arrested. His crime was peculiar: He had dared to construct a grand geometrical garden. In doing so, he violated an irrefutable hierarchy: that geometry, in its perfection, was a testament to divine right. The elegant, symmetrical designs were more than just ornament; they were proofs of incontestable certainty, and thus the authority to rule. But how did the French royalty fall in love with this peculiar landscape design? Wherefore Versailles?

An acclaimed journalist on contemporary China lays bare the country's two-decade quest for global dominance and how the Chinese Communist Party coopted what Western leaders have long considered their most powerful tool in the fight for liberal democracy—capitalism—to expand its illiberal...

Even on the most smog-bound of days, the rocky outcrop on which the Acropolis stands is visible above the sprawling roofscape of the Greek capital. Athens presents one of the most recognizable and symbolically freighted panoramas of any of the world's cities: the pillars and pediments of the Parthenon – the temple dedicated to Athena, goddess of wisdom, that crowns the Acropolis – dominate a city whose name is synonymous for many with civilization itself.

America began, we are often told, with the Founding Fathers, the men who waged a revolution and created a unique place called the United States. We may acknowledge the early Jamestown and Puritan colonists and mourn the dispossession of Native Americans, but we rarely grapple with the complexity of the nation’s pre-revolutionary past. In this pathbreaking revision, Daniel Richter shows that the United States has a much deeper history than is apparent - that far from beginning with a clean slate, it is a nation with multiple pasts.

Un viajero que recorriera el mundo en 1411 hubiera quedado deslumbrado por las imponentes civilizaciones orientales. La Ciudad Prohibida estaba en plena construcción en la China de los Ming; en Oriente Próximo, los otomanos acechaban Constantinopla. Por el contrario, los belicosos países de Europa occidental, Inglaterra, Escocia, Castilla, Aragón, Francia y Portugal, eran pobres y atrasados, debilitados por las epidemias, las pésimas condiciones sanitarias y las guerras incesantes.

The years 1800-1940 were the heyday of the independent explorer—free-spirited, mostly European adventurers who took incredible risks in pursuit of discovery and fame.

One of the most dynamic eras in American history, the 1920s began with a watershed year that would set the tone for the century to follow. The Roaring Twenties is the only decade in American history with a widely applied nickname, and our collective fascination with this era continues. But how did this surge of innovation and cultural milestones emerge out of the ashes of World War I?

This Series, in seven parts, tells the story of America from the earliest founding through the days of Woodrow Wilson and The Great War (World War I). In this volume, you'll hear stories of explorers and pioneers.

There is much of human history which we don’t know due to lost records, the oceans covering our ancestor’s cities, natural disasters, and reasons we don’t know. There are also many anomalies which have been found showing ruins and objects from the far past which should not exist.